Powerless

by Matthew Cody

  “Yeah? Well, you can take your thanks and shove it! I wasn’t here for you bunch of losers, I was here for me!” He leaned in close and practically growled, “Clay Cudgens is going to be the top dog in this town for a long, long time!”

  He turned and started the long trek back home, with Bud nipping at his heels. He hadn’t gotten far when he stopped and turned back. “You know what? I really should be thanking you, because I think I got something really great out of this whole mess. I got over my fear of heights.

  “Things are gonna change around this place,” he said with an ugly grin. “I promise.” Then he turned and disappeared into the trees.

  “Boy, does that kid know how to spoil a happy ending or what?” asked Rohan.

  Eric looped his arm around Rohan’s neck. “We’ll handle Clay Cudgens. Just like we always have.”

  “I guess we’d better think about getting back, too,” said Mollie. “I’d offer to fly someone, but I’m a little pooped.”

  “Yeah, me too,” agreed Eric.

  “So we bike home the old-fashioned way. Anyone want to place a few bets on who’ll be grounded the longest?” asked Rohan.

  “My mom’s gonna kill me,” said Mollie.

  “Are you kidding?” said Daniel. “The sheriff was over at my house! I’m an outlaw!”

  “Yeah, but I’ve been missing the longest,” bragged Eric.

  The Supers of Noble’s Green went on teasing each other for the next mile, until they encountered another patrol car with its flashing red lights. Only this time they didn’t bother to hide.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  The Legacy of Johnny Noble

  “There goes one.”

  “Where?” asked Eric, squinting to see. “There, just above the tree line.” Daniel pointed. “See where the handle of the Little Dipper dips down? It was right there.”

  “That was a plane,” said Rohan.

  “Are you sure?” Daniel asked Rohan, who just blinked in response. “Okay, okay. But I’m making a wish on it anyway, just to be safe.”

  “Can you wish for it to be a little warmer?” asked Mollie. “I’m freezing my butt off!” To illustrate her point she let out a long breath and watched as it turned to mist in the chilled night air.

  “Here,” said Eric, offering her his mug. “Have some more hot chocolate. It’ll warm you up.”

  “Thanks,” said Mollie. “Want some, Rohan?”

  “Sure,” said Rohan. “But watch the backwash.”

  The four of them sat on Eric’s front porch under a clear December sky. The temperatures had dropped steadily in the last few weeks, but they were still anxiously awaiting the first real snowfall of the year. With no snow on the ground, they had to satisfy themselves with other occupations like normal meteor showers and the pleasure of each other’s company.

  Other than at school, the Supers of Noble’s Green had seen very little of each other over the last month, due to the mass groundings that came out of the night at the quarry. When the group of friends turned up at the police station, all dirty and bruised and bloody, their parents had been nearly hysterical. Once they realized that all of the children were safe and accounted for, their hysteria turned to relief, then to anger. The kids told their parents the truth, as far as they were able. They said that they had been afraid when Eric went missing and had decided to search for him themselves. They found him trapped in the old quarry (that alone was an offense punishable by a monthlong grounding), and the children went to rescue him. It was close to the truth, but blurry enough to still be a lie. Not one of them felt good about it, but they all agreed that there were just some secrets that grown-ups were not ready to hear.

  And so there was no mention of Herman Plunkett or dark caves or any of that. In the end, Daniel suspected that the adults were actually a little impressed with the friends’ loyalty, even if they were absolutely furious with their bad judgment. The punishments were severe, but each child sat through the lectures and the groundings with the secret knowledge that they had accomplished an unspoken good—friends had been saved and their futures were brighter than ever before.

  It was now early December and their groundings would go on awhile longer, but four of the kids had been given a special one-day reprieve. After all, a boy turned thirteen only once in a lifetime.

  “So,” said Daniel. “What was your favorite gift?”

  “Daniel! You can’t ask Eric that!” chided Mollie.

  “I thought the remote-control plane was pretty cool,” said Rohan.

  “That one was mine,” said Daniel with a smile.

  “The gifts were great, guys, but I’m not really thinking about presents tonight.”

  Eric put his arm around Daniel’s shoulders and smiled. “I’m thinking about how lucky we all are that this new kid moved to Noble’s Green when he did.”

  “Yeah,” said Rohan. “Some things are just meant to be.”

  It was surprising how good it felt, to be one of them—to belong. At that moment, sitting with those three remarkable friends under a beautiful night sky, he knew that Eric was wrong—Daniel was the lucky one.

  “You guys are going to make me throw up birthday cake all over this porch,” said Mollie.

  “All right!” Eric laughed. “Point taken.”

  “You know,” said Rohan, looking up at the sky, “I can’t help wondering what it must’ve been like for them. For the original Supers, I mean. If Plunkett was telling the truth, then they could do almost anything….”

  “Yeah,” said Mollie. “They could all stare at moon craters together, then have stink-cloud contests.”

  “I’m serious,” said Rohan. “Flight, strength, invisibility, they could do it all. No limits. It’s kind of scary to think about all that power in the hands of a bunch of … well, a bunch of kids.”

  No one said anything for a while after that. The three of them just continued searching for the shooting stars that weren’t there, until they saw a car’s headlights and the driver honked at them.

  “That’s my dad,” said Rohan. “Come on, Mollie. We can drop you off on the way. You need a ride, Daniel?”

  “No thanks,” he answered. “My mom’s on her way.”

  “Okay. Well, it’s back to house arrest for all of us, I suppose.”

  “Yeah. Maybe with good behavior, we can get paroled in time for next summer’s break,” said Mollie, rolling her eyes.

  The two of them waved from the car as they drove away, leaving Daniel and Eric alone together on the porch.

  “Eric?” Daniel said after a minute. “Have you thought any more about who Rose said she saw? You know, in the cave?”

  Eric kept his eyes on the heavens, but Daniel could see the corners of his mouth turn down into a frown. “Yeah. I hope she’s lying.”

  “Why? If Johnny Noble really is still out there …”

  “Then he’s going to have to answer to me! Don’t you get it, Daniel? If Johnny Noble exists, then that means that he abandoned us. We were his children, and he ignored us for all these years while some creep like Plunkett preyed on us!”

  Daniel was taken aback by the sudden venom in Eric’s voice—the hurt. There was an anger in his friend, just under the surface, and it was kind of frightening. But it was over as quickly as it started.

  “Sorry,” Eric said, gesturing to the house behind him. “I guess I just have a thing with deadbeat deads. Listen, my mom’s going to be in there cleaning up for a while. Do you think you could do me one last birthday favor before your parents get here?”

  “Sure. What is it?”

  “Just keep a lookout,” he said with a smile. “Today’s my thirteenth birthday and there is something I’ve just gotta do!”

  And with that, Eric stretched out his arms, closed his eyes and slowly lifted off the ground. He reached twenty feet up into the air and just floated there. From where Daniel was, he could see the look on Eric’s face—it was pure ecstasy, freedom. It was joy. Then, like a bullet, he disappeared into t
he night sky.

  “Happy birthday, Eric,” said Daniel, plunging his hands into his coat pockets and stamping his feet to keep warm. “Happy birthday.”

  Back in his room, Daniel looked through his telescope one last time before bed.

  The stars were bright, but still static. Not a one fell.

  Daniel sat back and glanced over at the old photograph that he now had framed on his desk. In the picture were the original survivors of the St. Alban’s fire—just a few of the countless unwanted orphans from around the world, suddenly made special. There was Gram, and Daniel had spotted Mollie’s great-grandmother in the crowd. Rohan and Eric, Clay and Bud, Louisa and Rose and Michael and so many others had descended from those scared, lonely few. Daniel felt sad for them, for all of them—even Herman. They’d had no idea what was in store for them; they were only children after all.

  Daniel let his gaze drift over to the lights across the street. The Lees were probably going through their usual routines, oblivious to the remarkable daughter who had shown so much bravery in the face of so much fear. He knew that they loved their little girl, but he thought it a shame that they didn’t know—couldn’t know—what a hero she really was.

  Daniel’s eye was drawn to the streetlight near the edge of his yard. A man was standing there, looking up at Daniel’s window. It was the well-dressed man he’d met outside Plunkett’s house—the one who’d come to the house after Gram’s funeral—and he was smiling a big, bearded smile. He gave Daniel a small wave…. And like that, he was gone. In a blink, Daniel was looking at an empty street where the only movement was the slight stirring of the leaves.

  Daniel looked back at the photo, and this time he ignored the frightened faces of the children and focused instead on their savior, Johnny himself. The man in the photo was filthy, and sixty years younger—but Daniel knew him. He was sure of it. He remembered Rose’s message, the one delivered by the mysterious stranger who’d been watching them all along—there are more answers out there, for a good detective to find.

  Daniel stayed at his window for a long while, but nothing more happened. Johnny never reappeared. It was just an empty street.

  He was in the bathroom brushing his teeth when he heard Georgie pounding on the door.

  “My turn,” he was saying from out in the hallway. “My turn!” Georgie was speaking in small sentences now, which elicited an increasingly excited (and annoying) kind of enthusiasm from their parents.

  “No, Georgie,” Daniel called through a mouthful of toothpaste. “Wait your turn. Wait your turn!”

  Daniel saw the doorknob begin to twist, so he reached over and quickly pushed the lock on the door handle. The knob jiggled with Georgie’s frustration.

  Pleased with himself, Daniel turned back to spit in the sink when he heard a sharp crack, followed by the squeak of the door swinging open. Daniel turned to see Georgie standing in the open doorway, the doorknob clutched tightly in his hand.

  “My turn,” he said.

  Georgie had pulled the handle, lock and all, out of the door. He had ripped the doorknob off the door…. “No way!” gasped Daniel. “No way.”

  “Georgie?” came their father’s voice from down the hall. “What are you doing? Oh brother!”

  Their father appeared next to the diapered tot and took the dismembered doorknob out of his hand. “I thought I fixed this! The wooden door has warped, and now the darn handle keeps falling right out of the frame. Oh well. Looks like we’ll just have to knock for a while. Daniel, are you all right? You look a little pale, son….”

  Daniel couldn’t sleep. As always, there were questions that kept him awake. What would happen next? Daniel was proud of what he’d done for the Supers of Noble’s Green; he was glad that they had their futures back. But he also had a secret, a small fear that he could never share with them, with his friends who meant so much.

  He threw back his blankets, padded softly across the floor and pulled down a book from the tallest shelf.

  It was a special copy of the Sherlock Holmes story The Final Problem, which he set on his desk.

  The world was going to change, and Daniel knew it. Maybe not tomorrow, maybe not next month or even next year, but it would change. Eric, Mollie, Rohan, Louisa and even Rose were going to get older. They were going to grow up. So would Clay and Bud. And who knew who else? There might be children yet to discover, with powers yet to be explained. The Shroud would no longer threaten them, but over the years he had also used his fortune to help keep them a secret. Now that he was gone, how long would it be before the world discovered that there were genuine superheroes? And what would the Supers do in return?

  And then there was Plunkett’s warning about the comet, the fire from the sky, the Witch Fire….

  It’s coming back. And when it does, we must be ready.

  He remembered the paintings in Plunkett’s cave, the warnings left by a dead civilization. That was why Daniel kept the book on his top shelf—a special book with hollowed-out pages to hide its secret … a dark and terrible thing.

  Daniel opened the front cover and there, in a small space cut out of the very pages, was a ring. A small, innocent-looking ring of polished stone that no one knew about and, Daniel prayed, no one would ever have to use.

  Daniel’s attention was drawn again to the window, by a flicker of light and a quick movement in the corner of his vision. He peered through the glass and smiled. Then he placed the book (and its secret) back on its shelf.

  He carefully dragged his desk chair over to the window and sat down, propping his head in his hands. The street was still empty, but the sky was full of streaks of trailing fire. The shooting stars were golden, though, not green. It was just an ordinary meteor shower, and it lit the heavens over Mount Noble.

  Acknowledgments

  There are a lot of people to thank and I’m afraid I’ll leave out a few. Thanks to the wonderful writers of the Fantastic Saloon—both past and present. Thanks to James Bessoir for the constant reminder of how fun it is to be a boy. Thanks to Keyan Bowes for conversations on research and to Allison Wortche for her thoughtful edits. To my agent, Kate Schafer Testerman, for believing in me in the first place and being an all-around great friend, and to my editor, Joan Slattery, for giving me the chance and guiding me along the way.

  About the Author

  Matthew Cody divides his time between writing and teaching college English in New York City. Powerless, his first novel, comes from a lifelong love of superhero comics and 1940s pulp fiction.

  Originally from the Midwest, Matthew lives with his wife and young son in Manhattan, where he’s at work on his next novel for Knopf. You can visit him on the Web at www.matthewcody.com.

  THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2009 by Matthew Cody

  All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

  Knopf, Borzoi Books, and the colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

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  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Cody, Matthew.

  Powerless / Matthew Cody.—1st ed.

  p. cm.

  Summary: Soon after moving to Noble’s Green, Pennsylvania, twelve-year-old Daniel learns that his new friends have superpowers that they will lose when they turn thirteen, unless he can use his brain power to protect them.

  eISBN: 978-0-375-89353-7

  [1. Supernatural—Fiction. 2. Bullies—Fiction. 3. Moving, Household—Fiction. 4. Schools—Fiction.
5. Family life—Pennsylvania—Fiction. 6. Pennsylvania—Fiction. 7. Mystery and detective stories.] I. Title.

  PZ7.C654Pow 2009 [Fic]—dc22 2008040885

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